New Pics from the weekend

So my free flicker space is up for the month so here are a few favs from the weekend with Grandma Joan and Grampy Nat. More can be found on Hannah's flicker page.

Oh and btw the house is officially ours :)

Congrats Meghann and Chris

A beautiful baby girl!

Dakota GeGraw (middle name still undecided)

Saturday October 29th at 7:54 a.m

6 pounds 10 ounces 20 inches

Enjoy every moment of her you will cherish these moments forever.

Quick Update

Sorry it has been a couple days, life has been crazy wrapping up the house stuff and such.
Hannah has officially been discharged from Midwifery care. I say this with mixed emotions. I am glad that I no longer have to go to the office almost weekly, and I am elated that she has had good enough progress to be discharged, but I am sad for as many reasons. I will miss all the ladies at the office and the fabulous care that Hannah and I recieved in the past 9 months. I will miss seeing all the other pregos and babies that are healthy and well, and I will miss all the constant encouragement. Poor little Hannah is now released into the world of Western Medicine and doctors offices full of sickos. Ugh... reality!

So the numbers....
At 6 weeks 3 days old Hannah was 7lbs 9oz ( a 5 oz gain in 7 days) and 21.1 inches long ( almost a 2 inch gain in 6 weeks). Her heart and lungs and tummy are clear and functioning well. Her reflexes and reactions are right on pace for a little girl her age and her head control is awesome. Her head grew too, but I can't remember the numbers for that. How weird is it that at 6 weeks old she is only 1 ounce smaller that her Daddy when he was born and at birth she was 1 ounce bigger than me when I was born. She is our little girl that is for sure.

Well back to reality, Hannah has visitors this weekend, Grandma Joan and Grampy Nat are here this weekend, we also have to do a house inspection and sign the rest of the house papers this weekend.

I will post again soon, till then, who the hell ordered the minus anything weather? It was -2 when I started to post and it's -3 now! I am already hating winter!

how much?

My blog is worth $3,951.78.
How much is your blog worth?

New things...

Well I made the cake from Michelle's blog and it was awesome! I highly recommend it! IT did however take me the better part of 3 hours to make it and that was not including the 47 mins to bake it. Hannah was having no part of Mommy baking yesterday! I would feed her she would fall asleep and I would lay her down, head to the kitchen and get a single ingredient into the bowl and she would wake up and we would repeat the cycle! When Chris came home I finally got to concentrate on it because she slept for almost an hour on his chest!

I posted a bunch of new pics on My Flicker recently!

I am on a baking frenzy right now, all things apple! In the past 2 weeks I have bakes an apple pie, 24 apple tarts, applesaue a couple of times, apple crisp and most recently apple cake. Chris is loving it and my house smells so tasty :)

I am really enjoying being a domestic goddess however the pay sucks. I get to cook and bake and lounge in my jammies till noon if I want to. My house has never been cleaner and I have never been happier. I only wish that it was a little bit warmer so that we could go out for walks everyday. With Hannah being so small she doesn't fit into any of her really warm clothes yet. I think that the stroller has been used maybe 1/2 a dozen times at this point and both carriers have about the same amount of miles on them.

I think that I am going to go back to the gym tomorrow. Chris usually lets me have a couple hours to myself everyday so that he can spend time with Hannah, tomorrow I think I will go back to the gym on my free time. All this baking is not helping me lose the baby weight. Since I am only into 2 of the 14 pairs of jeans I own I think I need to get my butt in gear.

That's it for now.

Li'l Goats

As I am sure I have mentioned before I have found a wonderful line of baby products that work miracles on Hannah's sensitive skin. She was fortunate enough to inherit my fragrance sensitivity which has made bathtime and diaper changes a bit of a crap shoot( no pun intended).

Well the line of products that I have found to be saving grace is Canus Li'l Goats Milk!

The weekend of Hannah's first road trip I didn't their line of zinc cream with me substituting it for a small container of Penatin that I had in the diaper bag... Well that was a HUGE mistake! Hannah's poor little bum became red and raw after only 1 diaper change with Penatin. I had some Sudocreme with me too and the same results occurred. Needless to say I had one cranky passenger on my hands all weekend. As soon as I got home I changed her and slathered on the Li'l Goats Milk Zinc Ointment, by the next diaper change her bum was back to normal!

Now any of you who have kiddies know how ear piercing a sore bum cry is, so this product not only helps her bum it also helps my ears!

So after that weekend I decided to send Canus a quick email stating how I was thrilled with the product and how I have since then recommended it to several friends and even given it as gifts. I received a response from a lovely lady named Ann thanking me for my email and requesting my address so that she could send me a parcel of samples. I so obliged and it arrived today. I am now sitting her with a full size bottle of the Li'l Goats Milk Moisturizing Lotion and a sample size of the Shampoo/Body wash. Due to the excessive handwashing associated with having a baby the lotion was much appreciated and used immediately. It too meets the same product excellence as their Zinc Ointment, not only great for babies but great for Mommys!

I just wanted to give credit where credit is due, it is so rare in today's day and age to find great customer service coupled with great products. Way to go Canus!

The Baker's Rack

The Baker's Rack

For the baker in all of us! I found this site by way of Carmi.

I will let you all know how the apple cake turns out, I intend to bake it today if my darling Hannah will nap for a couple of hours.

Speaking of napping, Hannah has slept 6 consecutive hours in a row 2 nights in a row, from 9ish to 3:25am. Now if only we can get her to move that from say 11pm to 5am then sleep would not be such a novelty for Mommy!

Hannah's First Dress

Today we went out for Sunday breakfast before everyone headed out Jeepin and I made sure that Hannah was dressed appropriatly in her best Sunday dress. It is hard to believe that she will be 6 weeks old tomorrow and she is still comfortably fitting into preemie clothes. She has however graduated into the next size of diapers and is starting to be able to wear a few of her 0-3 months sleepers. She may actually get to wear most of her 6 snowsuits this winter.

Holy Crap

WE got it!
WE have a house!
WE have a yard!
WE have 2 bathrooms and a washer and a dryer and a fridge and a stove and 4 bedrooms and NO LANDLORD!!!!

WOW, amazing what can happen in your life in 24 hours!

So as of December 5th 2005 we take possession of this house!

I am completely dumbfounded!

Huge day in my world

Well it started with a visit to the midwife... Hannah is back on the gaining path and is finally over 7lbs! She is up 7 oz in 7 days and is now 7lbs 4oz! Go boobie moo!

Then the 3 of us went out looking at houses today... (another arson fire in the neighbourhood tonight, just pure coincidence)... and actually put in a conditional offer on one the agent took us by on his hunch that we might like it. The first 2 we looked at were dumps with great lots the second is a gem with a pretty good lot in a better neighbourhood... check it out!

OH AND

HAPPY 30TH BIRTHDAY BIZ!

Whooo Hoooo!

We woke up yesterday morning and Hannah's Red Rash of Baby has cleared up! We are back to beautiful clear baby soft skin. After talking to my midwife about the rash she figured it was a reaction to something that she was around. Since it was only on her face and neck and upper chest the first thing I eliminated was Bounce sheets from mine and Chris's laundry. She is always rubbing up against our clothes so it was worth a try. It seems to be the culprit. So Chris and I will suffer through rough jeans and staticy clothes because we love our daughter. A small price to pay to enjoy her beauty.

Blog , Blah, Blah

Hannah Yesterday in a brief break from feeding.

Thank you to Heather for writing this blog entry and thank you to Carmi for writing about it and sending me down the path to reading it.

For those of you who know what has been going on in my life as a new Mom since my last entry you will understand how important Heather's entry would be to someone like me. For those who don't know the deal I will explain.

On Thursday last Hannah and I ventured to the Midwife for our 1 month appointment. Now Hannah being such a little tyke at birth it is really important that she gains weight well, this unfortunately was not the case. Due to her size they would like her to put on 2/3 oz. or more a day. In 16 days Hannah only put on 8 oz... That breaks down to 1/2 oz per day and clearly below the minimum requirement. After discussing her behaviours over the past 2 weeks, my midwife and I devised a plan. I will spare you the details but lets just say that it has resulted in Hannah cluster feeding for anywhere between 2 and 4 hours at a time. This has resulted in one really tired, sore and stressed out Mommy and one very irritated Daddy. For all the reasons Heather mentioned in her blog and for several of my own ( convenience being the #1) I am determined to breastfeed until Hannah is 6 months old. Well last night in one of her many stints of incessant feeding the thought of formula entered my head. Maybe it was the delirium that is brought on by sleep deprivation, or maybe it was the whole idea of someone else getting to feed her without me having to bruise my breasts with a pump( I have a new one in transit as I type this to solve the bruising issue), or maybe it was just me forgetting all the excellent reasons why breast feeding is a superior method over formula feeding. Needless to say Heather's entry has put me back on the path. Like every other tough moment in life I am sure that this too will pass.
For those of you who are pregnant or are trying to get pregnant, please do not let this sway you from breastfeeding. It can be very difficult to get the hang of it, especially if Mom is a control freak and baby is very tiny. Believe me when I say it will get easier, there is a huge learning curve with having a newborn that no book can prepare you for. Baby's and Mommy's are like snowflakes no two are alike and no two present themselves in the same manner twice. Patience and persistence will get you through this. Your baby deserves it.

So now that I am revitalized and back on the determined breastfeeding path, I again want to thank Heather and Carmi and Tess from Positively BreastFeeding for helping me through this bump in the road.

For those of you following the numbers these are them...
Hannah @ birth 5lbs 13 oz
Day after birth 5lbs 9oz
Day 5 5lbs 12 oz
2 week visit 6lbs 5 oz
4 week visit 6lbs 13 oz
5 week visit ... shooting for 7lbs 2 oz at least!

Stay tuned.

Following mkuiack's lead

mkuiack

Top Ten Reasons I Love My New Job
aka Mom!

10. A year off of my other job.
9. Shopping for little girls is so much fun.
8. The look in her eyes when she looks at me.
7. The look in his eyes when he looks at her.
6. The freedom to nap, repeatedly!
5. The peacefulness of a baby's sleep.
4. The smell of her.
3. Bathtime Smiles.
2. They said I would never be one, but love brought her.

and the number one reason why I love my new job.....

1. Because it is the hardest job I have ever had with the crapiest pay but the biggest rewards, no other job could match unconditional love.

Hannah is 1 month old today

Hannah and Mommy had a chat about hockey and such today, since Hannah is a month old now she understands the importance of being a Leafs fan and this was her response when we discussed the Habs and what she should think of them!

What you mean the Leafs won last night! Well it is about time!

Sleep....

It's A Daddy and Hannah thing!

Hannah's First Thanksgiving

Well there was another roadtrip this weekend, this time east to Grandma and Grandpa Fenton's.
They had an open house for everyone in the family to come and meet Hannah, Grandpa John and Step Grandma Debbie were there too. Hannah got to meet lots of people, Great Aunt Lori and Great Uncle Paul, Cousins Jason and Dawn and their daughter Madi, Great Aunt Janet and Auntie Janet(aka Auntie Toad), Great Grandma Andrus and various other drop ins over the course of the weekend. It was a quick visit, again Hannah was really fussy since pass the baby game was being played and she hates it.

There were some great pics taken though...

4 Generations
Hannah and her
Mommy,
Grandma
and
Great Grandma

Close up of Hannah
and her
Great Grandma Gladys.










More on My Flicker page. Saturday night we all watched the Leafs get squished by the damn Habs. So far Hannah has not seen the Leafs win... 0 and 2, stupid shoot out!
Well that is all for now enjoy the pics.

Bathtime smiles

Hannah is starting to Smile :)

Maybe it's a birthday smile for her Auntie Melissa... Happy 21st Melissa!

These are why

She needs
slippers!

For the Little Leafs Fan

These would be a great gift for Hannah for Christmas or for any other reason someone may have to purchase her a great pair of booties. They can be found here!

Big Weekend

Well Hannah went on her first road trip this weekend. She is not much for the car seat but loves the Jeep once it is moving. We house hopped all weekend, started out at her Great Uncle Peter's, just north of Pickering where we stayed the night. The next afternoon we moved on to Oshawa to her Great Aunt Betty's, then to Whitby to her Great Aunt Lucy's then all the way to Beaverton to visit Grandma Joan and Step Grandpa Nat. Once we got to Beaverton we had an early Thanksgiving celebration complete with Uncle Patrick, Aunt Melissa and Turkey :)

I love Turkey! Probably since I never got it at home when I was growing up. My Mom doesn't like it and would not cook it, I would eat it once a week if I could.
I also got carrot cake :-p Yummy! Joan makes it just right, 2 inches of cake and half an inch of icing, it was awesome, and still is(there is a bit left in my fridge).

Grandma Joan gave Hannah a bath which she loved! She was pretty good all weekend but really fussy, she is really not a big fan of pass the baby, the game that everyone loves to play with a newborn.

Finally got home last night around 7 after making a visit to the Vaughn Mills Mall. Nno really great deals to speak of for me but Hannah got a new denim dress for 8 bucks and Chris got a sweet Quicksilver snowboarding jacket for 91 bucks tax in!

As for today... Hannah is officially 3 weeks old! She is growing like a weed. This weekend she grew out of her first set of preemie outfits and is now wearing some of her 1 month stuff. Only a week ahead of schedule. Actually it is her length that has forced her out of the preemie stuff, she is still skinny enough for them, but she still looks pretty damn cute in her pink jailhouse stripes that she got from her Great Aunt Peggy and Great Uncle Richard.


I celebrated her birth today in 2 ways... First I went for a bike ride! OMG was it awesome! The freedom that I missed so much since about 20 weeks pregnant. That was the point that I had to retire the bike to the basement until I could handle a seat again. Next summer I will be back at it full time with a baby jail in tow! The second thing I did was let Daddy feed Hannah for the first time. I was really afraid of nipple confusion but since she has taken a pacifier without any ill effects on breastfeeding we tried a bottle out today with pumped milk and everything seems to be fine. She ate a whole ounce for her Daddy then came back for more to me. Oh my little piggy. He was such a proud Daddy, she was a bit confused though not quite sure what to think of a hairy shest complete with food. Now that we know that she will eat from a bottle that means that I will actually get to learn how to snowboard this winter. Grandma Joan will get lots of Hannah time since she lives near the ski hills!

Well that's all for today folks.